The manufacture of flavoring compositions for food products has been an important industry for many years. Natural flavors derived from vegetables, fruits, nuts, spices, and other sources have been items of commerce which are combined with other foods to provide a wide variety of tastes and textures for the consumer.
One highly desirable flavor is the flavor of fresh roasted peanuts. The peanut, or groundnut as it is often called outside the United States, is the seed or fruit of the peanut plant. The present seed, which includes a pair of cotyledons, comprises a system of oil dispersed within a solid matrix. When the peanuts are ground, however, the ground or divided solids are dispersed within an oil or lipid phase. The same is true of most other nuts, legumes and the like, although some have only a single cotyledon. The fats or oils are primarily hydrophobic lipid materials which, in combination with the substantially proteinaceous solids, can provide pleasing flavor and texture in food systems. Because of their hydrophobic or lipophilic nature, however, the oil tends to separate from the predominantly hydrophilic proteinaceous solids when ground peanuts are mixed in many food systems. Other ground nut and legume products also separate in a similar manner. Therefore, the separation of hydrophobic oil and hydrophilic solids pose a significant problem which needs to be addressed in the formulation of ground peanut-containing compositions and the like.
A further problem is that, because the solids are dispersed within the oil phase, ground nut, legume, and particularly peanut products are considerably oily to the touch and do not, therefore, make particularly good finger food. Because of the oily surface characteristics of these products, they do not make a very good fill for candies or pastries either. Peanut flavored candy fillings have been made by adding tremendous amounts of sugar to provide a crystalline matrix for the oil phase, but this tends to override the peanut flavor and makes the end product too sweet for many consumers. Furthermore, it is believed that nut and legume flavors, particularly roasted peanut flavors, are significantly diminished when the solids are dispersed in the oil phase as compared to providing a solids matrix in which the oil is dispersed as is believed to occur in peanuts and other nuts and legumes in nature.
Accordingly, substantial needs exist for gravitationally-stabilized nut and peanut-containing compositions which are not significantly oily to the touch, so that they may provide a form and texture which can be used for finger foods, candy fillings, pastry fillings and the like, while providing a true nut or peanut flavor. A need also exists for gravitationally-stabilized nut and peanut-containing food products which provide a solids matrix in which the oil is dispersed similar to that provided in nature by peanuts and other nuts and legumes. Furthermore, a general need exists for gravitationally-stabilized solid or semi-solid mixtures. The ability to produce new protein rich products which are sufficiently hardened to offer nut and peanut finger foods having significant shelf stability may open markets for new products offering robust natural flavors provided by a food system which has the same general form as that of the natural system from which it is originally derived.
It will be appreciated from the foregoing that the prior art presents problems which are in need of solutions. The present invention provides solutions for these and other problems.